merit
Life’s Better Under the American Family Insurance Roof shows when you feel totally protected, you’re free to enjoy your dreams. The roof protects our dreamers from any potential threat as it hovers over key moments of consumers enjoying their dreams in an invisible house or car.
We turned a 60+ year logo into a meaningful metaphor. It leveraged magical realism to create stunning visuals that broke through the insurance clutter. It used music to drive cultural relevance and a distinct sonic treatment to surround the viewer in the sound of protection. Intimate cinematography made consumers the star. For example, the celebration of a solid family structure and #blacklove is a passion point that runs counter to the narrative of broken black homes. In “Newborn,” we buck the stereotype by featuring a black father doting on his newborn son as a culturally relevant oldie “Lean On Me,” by Bill Withers, becomes a lullaby. In “Drive” we celebrate black weddings, honoring the celebration of legacy while modernizing it by featuring the ceremonial broom. The soundbed is a cult classic hip hop remix of a classic love song–with the beat dropping at the exact moment of the brand’s protection.
American Family Insurance is a midwestern company that operates in 19 states with an aging book of business. The category consists of national household names like Geico, Allstate, Progressive and State Farm that spend upwards of $100BN annually, outspending us 10:1.
To attract a younger, increasingly multicultural audience, the competition used their vast budgets to leverage chaos, celebrities, characters and comedy to entertain and capture attention, rarely speaking about the benefits and importance of insurance itself.
In digging into the mindset of these younger, multicultural consumers, we realized that one of their greatest fears is experiencing a setback that could be so damaging, they lose the dreams they’ve worked hard for.
They perceive insurance companies as untrustworthy and intimidating, driven by behemoths that treat consumers like policies, not people.
To meaningfully engage, we needed to breakthrough and reframe insurance from a laughing matter to a protector of dreams.
This was our first time creatively and strategically leading the integrated agency team of holding company powerhouses, the pressure was on. Our goal was to punch above our weight and increase awareness and breakthrough in a cluttered category while driving relevance and differentiation among our core multicultural under 40 audience.
AWARENESS: Increased brand awareness by 9 percent for the under 40 audience in a category that has been in general decline since 2019.
BREAKTHROUGH: Increased ad recognition for those under 40. Doubled Brand Linkage and increased Message Linkage by 40 percent for our key target.
RELEVANCE: Increased relevance by 17 points and increased brand perception for multicultural audiences in key areas including: was relevant to me/my needs, and gave you a good feeling about the brand.
DIFFERENTIATION: Increased an average of 4.5 percentage points across multicultural audiences against: was unique and different.
Most importantly, we turned perception and positive sentiment into policies - exceeding all new policy goals for 2023 before the end of the third quarter.
